PM Modi has given flexibility to the State Governments to impose curfews and lockdowns depending upon the Covid intensity in their respective States. He dared not go for ‘national lockdown’ considering the financial crisis. However, one by one, most States have declared lockdown in the face of unchecked rise in the virus cases. Kerala, Bihar, Maharashtra, Delhi and Orissa have gone for total lockdown.
Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Gujarat and Jammu have also declared partial or weekend lockdowns. Karnataka has decided to impose lockdown as its daily cases have reached over 50,000 and Bangalore is the worst hit. Tamil Nadu has already restricted travel on its borders with Andhra Pradesh.
As such, almost all the States surrounding the Telugu States have gone into either total or partial lockdown in the past few days. However, Telugu CMs KCR and Jaganmohan Reddy are sticking to their stands of ‘no lockdown’. Experts say both the CMs are greatly worried about their Governments’ finances if their States were shut down for the second time.
Both AP and Telangana are in bad shape financially because of the large scale welfare spendings. The BJP regime at the Centre is not extending a helping hand to them for political reasons.
